Shotlist

1. Wayne State University law professor Peter Henning works in his campus office

2. SOUNDBITE: (English) Peter Henning, Wayne State Law Professor:

"Attorney General Barr has decided that they're going to make a recommendation for a much lighter sentence, not the seven to nine years. So, that's really just a slap in the face of the prosecutors who actually prosecuted Roger Stone and obtained the convictions. So, I guess in a sense, the higher levels in the Department of Justice don't really care."

"What we have seen from the Department of Justice is a real lack of independence. Typically, the Justice Department is not influenced by the president. But in this particular instance, you can see that the Department of Justice has been influenced by President Trump's tweet and his statement that a seven to nine year sentence was just too harsh for one of his cronies."

Storyline

A legal expert says the Justice Department's decision to overrule its own lawyers in the case of President Donald Trump's longtime ally is a "slap in the face" to those attorneys.

The four lawyers have quit the case after the DOJ overruled them and said it would lower the amount of prison time it would seek for Roger Stone. The resignations raise questions over whether Trump had at least indirectly exerted his will on a Justice Department he often views as an arm of the White House. Trump and the Justice Department say there was no communication. The Republican president blasted the original sentencing recommendation as "horrible and unfair." On Wednesday, he tweeted congratulations to Attorney General William Barr.

"Attorney General Barr has decided that they're going to make a recommendation for a much lighter sentence, not the seven to nine years. So, that's really just a slap in the face of the prosecutors who actually prosecuted Roger Stone and obtained the convictions," Peter Henning, a law professor at Wayne State University in Detroit, said Wednesday.

"So, I guess in a sense, the higher levels in the Department of Justice don't really care" that the four prosecutors left the case, Henning said during an interview.

The department insisted the decision to undo the sentencing recommendation was made Monday night, before Trump's tweet, and prosecutors had not spoken to the White House about it. Even so, the departures of the entire trial team broke open a simmering dispute over the punishment of a Trump ally whose case has long captured the Republican president's attention.

"What we have seen from the Department of Justice is a real lack of independence," said Henning, a former federal prosecutor in Washington, D.C. "Typically the Justice Department is not influenced by the president.

"But in this particular instance, you can see that the Department of Justice has been influenced by President Trump's tweet and his statement that a seven to nine year sentence was just too harsh for one of his cronies."

Stone was convicted of lying to Congress, witness tampering and obstructing the House investigation into whether the Trump campaign coordinated with Russia to tip the 2016 election. He has denied wrongdoing and called the case politically motivated.